Authentic Science Fiction, December 1951 — page 46: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

44 THE MOON IS HEAVEN we've lost, but Atah’s surveying kit. He may not be able to tap resources so well.’’ Well, you think. That’s bad for Atah, but it could be a lot worse for everybody. You aren’t going to worry about it. Hugging the reactor safely against your chest, you walk on to the dome. There are things you’d like to say to Reina, but the thought of the others hearing stops you. At the dome, you see that Clavier has turned up again and is at work on the oxygen supply equipment. He looks up as your jet black shadow falls across him. ‘You are the most untransparent man I’ have ever seen,”’ he says good humouredly. ‘‘ Kindly step aside if you wish to continue breathing—Ah, what have you there? The apparatus for electrolysis? Bien! Now Ican work. I have found a big, big—how you say?—deposit of snow. We will have plenty of air.”’ That at least is something, you think. Air and food will keep you, going, even if it’s not very pleasant. You should be able to last out until Schnabel gets that lock fixed. The technologist has already welded the alitubing into the base of the dome. Now Clavier carefully unscrews the valve that releases oxygen from the bottles. The mercury in the manometer slowly drops as the vacuum inside the dome begins to fade away. It’s becoming livable inside there. Pretty soon, everyone is standing around watching the oozing of the oxygen into the dome, watching the mercury drop until there is no vacuum at all, but a positive pressure. Then Clavier cuts off the supply. Reina steps towards the air-lock in the side of the dome and starts to open it. Clavier calls her, ‘Not yet, Mademoiselle Reina, please! There may be a leak of some size.’ He turns to Schnabel. ‘‘ Not that I doubt your work, my friend, but we cannot take chances, eh?”’ The technologist nods without answering. You can see he’s confident that there won’t be a leak. And he’s right. comicbooks.com